David Headley Says Ishrat Jehan Was A Lashkar Member

Mumbai : Terrorist David Coleman Headley has told aMumbai court that Ishrat Jehan, the 19-year-old student killed in an encounter in Gujarat in 2004, was a member of Pakistan-based terror group Lashkar e Taiba.

Headley, who is testifying on the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack from an undisclosed location in the US via video link, picked Ishrat's name when the prosecutor questioning him gave him "options" of female suicide bombers in the Lashkar.

Asked about a "botched up operation in India", Headley said he had learnt about such an operation from a conversation between Lashkar commander Zaki Ur Rehman Lakhvi and the outfit's military chief Muzammil Bhat.

"Later I asked Muzammil and he said there was a female member of the LeT who was killed in a police shootout at a naka (picket). The exact place I cannot recall," Headley said. He has named Ishrat before, but for the first time in court.

Ishrat, who was from Mumbra in Mumbai, was shot dead along with three men in Gujarat in 2004 by police officers who claimed that they were terrorists involved in a plot to kill Narendra Modi, then the Chief Minister.

The killing triggered a political debate over whether Ishrat Jehan was a terrorist or an innocent college student killed in cold blood.

The Congress and other opposition parties allege that Ishrat was innocent. The Congress-led UPA government was embarrassed when in 2009, it was revealed that a home ministry report to a court said Ishrat and her friends were Lashkar members.

The BJP accused the Congress of misusing investigative agencies to link Narendra Modi and his then home minister Amit Shah to the Ishrat Jehan killing and other controversial encounters in the run-up to the 2014 national elections.

"After Headley's revelations it is clear that it was not a fake encounter. She was even called the 'daughter of Bihar'. The ministers who had then complained should take back their statements," said BJP's Shahnawaz Hussain.

Seven officers of the Gujarat police accused in the case are out on bail.

The CBI has also accused Intelligence Bureau officers of a role in the killing. The Intelligence Bureau has said that though its officers had alerted the Gujarat police to the possibility that Ishrat and the others could be affiliated to the Lashkar-e-Taiba, its officers did not authorize or participate in the killing.

Q&A IN COURT WITH DAVID HEADLEY ON ISHRAT JEHAN

Q: There is a women's wing in the LeT?
A: Yes.

Q: Who is the head?
A: The mother of Abu Aiman.

Q: Are there female suicide bombers in LeT?
A: No I don't know.

Q: Can you name a suicide bomber?
A: I cannot name.

Q: Was there a botched up operation in India?
A: There was a botched-up operation which I learnt while Zaki Ur Rehman Lakhvi was talking to Muzammil Bhat.

A: Later I asked Muzammil and he told there was a female member of the LET who was killed in a police shootout at a Naka (picket). Exact place I cannot recall.

Q: I gave you three options. Noor Begum. Ishrat Jehan and ...
A: Ishrat Jehan

David Headley identifies Ishrat Jahan as LeT operative: What will happen to the case that sent Amit Shah to jail?

As the Mumbai trial court hears 26/11-accused David Coleman Headley’s testimony over video, all eyes will probably look towards Delhi and the political fallout that it could have. Headley’s “testimony” would have been passed off as important but routine to a terror-related investigation, but for a claim that has dogged the interrogation report for years. In 2009, a team from India’s National Investigation Agency had travelled to the US for a court-sanctioned three-day interaction with Headley and put together an “interrogation report” (IR) that made startling revelations about Pakistan’s official support for the 26/11 Mumbai attack.

However, more than the sensational claims about Pakistan’s role, what caused a political brouhaha were claims that Headley had also confirmed that a young woman from Mumbai, Ishrat Jahan, was a Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) agent. At that time, the Congress-led UPA government was in power and the CBI was investigating the encounter that killed Ishrat Jahan and her compatriots. The encounter had taken place when the current BJP president Amit Shah was the Gujarat’s home minister. He had to resign as home minister and spend months in jail before being bailed out, but had to live outside Gujarat as part of bail conditions.

Shah — and by proxy, Narendra Modi, the then Gujarat chief minister — was under attack by the Opposition and rights groups that claimed Ishrat was a innocent tourist in Gujarat. However, the copy of the interrogation report that was filed in court never had any reference to Jahan, even though subsequent leaked photocopies of the document began to show this new paragraph. Today, if Headley does mention Jahan in his testimony to the magistrate, then it is likely to set off a fresh round of political allegations.

But beyond its impact on the current political climate, the contents of the interrogation report are the clearest account of how the Pakistani establishment helped the 26/11 attackers.

It recorded how three serving Pakistani military officials of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) worked with the LeT leadership to train terrorists as well as help them identify targets. Identified as Colonel Shah, Major Sameer and Major Ali, Headley gave a detailed account of their meetings and discussions when he would brief them after every visit to India. In all, Headley made six visits to India (today in court he put that number at eight), detailing the GPS coordinates to the Taj Mahal Hotel, the Trident hotel and the Chabad House in Colaba.

He also visited other key installations in India and delivered those coordinates to his Pakistani handlers.

Healey’s testimony was also the first “evidence” of the links between terrorism in India and the Al-Qaeda. Although this was a tenuous link, it provided a glimpse into how international jihadi outfits competed and cooperated with each other. Headley spoke about his meetings with a former Pakistani Army commando Ilyas Kashmiri, who had floated a new terror group known as 313 Brigade. They had links with the Al-Qaeda, and Kashmiri was known to have even met the Al-Qaeda’s emir, Osama Bin Laden.

Interestingly, the role played by Headley’s third wife of Moroccan origin, Faiza Outllah, also added further revelations to the whole plan. Her complaint to the US Embassy in Islamabad and her claims that she had tried to warn the Americans about the 26/11 attack were startling and added a new dimension to the plot.

Born as Daood Gilani — the son of Pakistani diplomat Sayyid Salim Gilani and an American mother — he would adopt his mother’s name and wipe out his Pakistani links, probably on the advice of the LeT leadership. With a US passport, he had easy access to various countries and used them to collect intelligence and plan terror attacks for the LeT. The fact that the Indian consulate in Chicago issued several visas over the years to him without red-flagging them, proved to be one of the key failures when it came to preventing the 26/11 attack. Today, it remains to be seen if he will repeat the bulk of what he had stated in his interrogation report. If he does, it will become evidence in a court of law and will have major implications for Pakistan globally as well as for India’s current fractious political climate.

In a major revelation, David Coleman Headley on Thursday referred to Mumbra (a town near Mumbai) girl Ishrat Jehan as a suicide bomber of terror group Lashkar-e-Toiba. Ishrat, Javed Sheikh alias Pranesh Pillai and two Pakistani nationals Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Jowher were gunned down at Kotarpur in Ahmedabad on June 15, 2004.

During his deposition, he refered to a woman killed in a police encounter on Indian soil. When he was given three names, he claimed that the name of the woman was Ishrat Jahan. Ishrat's family, since the encounter took place in 2004, has been alleging that it was a botched up operation by the Gujarat Police.

He also exposed how ISI and LeT majorly funded terror operations in India and financed him from time to time.

He also exposed how ISI and LeT majorly funded terror operations in India and financed him from time to time.

"Before coming to India in September 2006, he received $25,000 from ISI's Major Iqbal. I also got 40,000 in Pakistani currency from LeT operative Sajid Mir between April and June 2008. Major Iqbal gave me counterfeit Indian currency once or twice in 2008," he told the court, adding that Major Iqbal used to regularly sent him money in instalments.

"Tahawur Rana (Headley's associate and a Pakistani native who operated a Chicago-based immigration business) used to send me money from the US in September 2006 when I came to India to do intelligence work on instructions of LeT," he said.

We are sure that Ishrat Jahan was not a terrorist, says her family member

Bengaluru, Feb 11: With David Headley revealing that Ishrat Jahan was a terrorist, her family members have reacted sharply, on his claims. Till now, Ishrat Jahan's family members have maintained that she was an innocent girl, who was killed in a fake encounter. Ishrat Jahan "If she had been caught alive, then the truth would have prevailed. Now that she is dead, people can say anything", Mussarat Jahan, her sister said. [What all secular media said about Ishrat Jahan few years ago] "Why did the prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam ask so many questions to Headley about Ishrat Jahan? Was this case about Ishrat Jahan or was it about 26/11", she asked. [Ishrat Jahan: A tale of two testimonies] While asserting that we will continue to fight for justice, she said, "the truth will prevail someday and we are sure that she was not a terrorist and the encounter by the Gujarat police was a fake one." [Ishrat Jahan case: A timeline] Meanwhile, BJP's spokesperson Nalin Kohli told media, "a major issue has been laid to rest on Ishrat Jahan. Many had accused the Gujarat government." Not speaking much, Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari said "let the matter be probed". 19-year-old college student Ishrat Jahan along with three other men were killed in an alleged encounter by officers of Ahmedabad Crime Branch on June 15, 2004. On July 3, 2013, the CBI, the prosecuting agency of the encounter case, had filed a chargesheet and stated that Mumbra-based college girl Ishrat Jahan, Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Zeeshan Johar and Amjad Ali Rana were gunned down in a fake encounter on June 15, 2004 in a joint operation of IB and Gujarat Police.

The statement has revived political sparring over whether Ishrat was an innocent student killed in cold blood or a terrorist shot down before she could execute a plan to assassinate Narendra Modi, then the Chief Minister of Gujarat.

Headley, who is testifying on the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack from an undisclosed location in the US via video link, picked Ishrat's name when the prosecutor questioning him listed "options" of female members of the Lashkar.

Headley said he had learnt about a "botched-up operation" from a conversation between Lashkar commander Zaki Ur Rehman Lakhvi and military chief Muzammil Bhat.

Headley said: "Later I asked Muzammil and he said there was a female member of the LeT who was killed in a police shootout at a naka (picket). The exact place I cannot recall." He has named Ishrat for the first time in court, but legally, it may not stand because it is hearsay.

Ishrat, who was from Mumbra near Mumbai, was shot dead along with three men on June 15, 2004, by Gujarat police officers.

The Congress says Ishrat was framed but it was embarrassed when its own government said in a statement in court in 2009 that Ishrat and her friends were Lashkar terrorists. But another statement filed within a month had no reference to Ishrat's alleged Lashkar links.

The BJP accused the Congress of misusing investigative agencies to link Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, his home minister in Gujarat, to Ishrat's killing and other controversial encounters in the run-up to the 2014 national elections. It also accused the Congress government of trying to hide that Headley had named Ishrat as a Lashkar terrorist to National Investigation Agency officials.

The political row also reflected in a conflict between the CBI and the Intelligence Bureau. The CBI accused Intelligence Bureau officers of a role in the killing and of planting weapons to make Ishrat look like a terrorist. The Intelligence Bureau, however, said though its officers had alerted the Gujarat police to the possibility that Ishrat could be linked to the Lashkar, its officers did not authorize or participate in the killing.

"After Healey's revelations it is clear that it was not a fake encounter. She was even called the 'daughter of Bihar'," said BJP's Shahnawaz Hussain. Congress leader Manish Tewari said: "To try and extrapolate Headley's testimony to justify an encounter that CBI found to be fake is by no stretch of imagination permissible."

The lawyer representing Ishrat's mother has alleged a "larger conspiracy" and said the prosecution asked Headley leading questions.

Ishrat Jahan was a suicide bomber of Lashkar, David Coleman Headley says

UMBAI: In a significant claim, Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley on Thursday said that Ishrat Jahan — who was killed in an alleged fake encounter in 2004 in Gujarat— was actually a suicide bomber of terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba.

The disclosure is likely to ignite a fresh row around the controversial encounter.

Testifying via video link from the US, Headley spilled the beans on the 19-year-old Mumbra girl and picked up her name when quizzed by special public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam about a "botched up operation" mentioned to him (Headley) by LeT commander Zaki-ur Rehman Lakhvi.

Headley told the court that Lakhvi had mentioned to him about a "botched-up operation" conducted in India by another LeT operative Muzammil Butt where a female member of the terror outfit was killed.

Prodded by Nikam to elaborate on the operation and the members involved in it, Headley said, "(I was told) It was a shootout with police in which a (female) suicide bomber was killed."

To which the prosecutor prompted three names of which Headley picked up Jahan before telling the court that "there is a female wing in LeT and one Abu Aiman's mother headed it."

Four persons - Ishrat Jahan, Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Amjadali Akbarali Rana and Zeeshan Johar - were killed in an encounter with Gujarat Police on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on June 15, 2004.

The city crime branch had then said that those killed in the encounters were LeT terrorists and had landed in Gujarat to kill then chief minister Narendra Modi.

The CBI, which took over probe from the Gujarat high court appointed special investigation team (SIT), had filed chargesheet in August 2013 saying that the encounter was fake and executed in the joint operation by the city crime branch and Subsidiary Intelligence Bureau (SIB).

In further disclosures, the 55-year-old, who recently turned approver in the 26/11 case, also told the court that that LeT operative Muzammil Butt was the head of his (Headley's) group before Sajid Mir.

He told the court that a person, whom he identified as Abu Dujuna introduced him to Muzammil.

Headley said that he and Muzammil had once visited Kashmir to fight against the Indian troops.

Earlier in the day, Headley exposed how ISI and LeT majorly funded terror operations in India and financed him from time to time and that Pakistan native Tahawwur Rana visited Mumbai before the terror strikes in November 2008, which left 166 people dead and 309 injured.

The LeT operative also said that RBI had turned down his request to open a bank account for their office in India.

Giving details of his funding, Headley said, "Before coming to India in September 2006, he received $25,000 from ISI's Major Iqbal."

"I also got 40,000 in Pakistani currency from LeT operative Sajid Mir between April and June 2008," he told the court, adding that Major Iqbal used to regularly send him money in instalments.

Also, Major Iqbal gave me counterfeit Indian currency once or twice in 2008, he said.

"Tahawur Rana (Headley's associate and a Pakistani native who operated a Chicago-based immigration business) used to send me money from the US in September 2006 when I came to India to do intelligence work on instructions of LeT," he told the court.

He also said that "it was my idea to open an office in India. It was a part of my cover (as an immigration consultant). I had discussed about this with Major Iqbal and Sajid Mir and they both agreed to it."

"I also told Rana that Major Iqbal had asked me to do intelligence work in India. Iqbal told me that if Rana was reluctant to be associated with this (Headley's India operations) then he (Headley) should appeal to his (Rana's) sense of patriotism towards Pakistan," he testified.

99% times the family members of terrorists doesn't know that their kids are terrorists and killing innocents, if you ask any one of them they'll say that their kid has been framed, so what's the point in talking with Ishrat's parents ??

99% times the family members of terrorists doesn't know that their kids are terrorists and killing innocents, if you ask any one of them they'll say that their kid has been framed, so what's the point in talking with Ishrat's parents ??

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Even if they know that their children are terrorists, they will still feign innocence. What person would risk associating with a terrorist? Not even a ta-kafir.

What's her motivation to became a Jihadi,I mean there is nothing in Jannat for Ishrat jahan unless she was homosexual.

She was a fidayeen and could've attacked Modi just like the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi.

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What, you want to read people's minds now.
The biggest motivation is always money, not jannat.

Every so called "terrorist" is getting paid by some government, and is technically a soldier.
Killing an enemy soldier who is engaged in sabotage is the duty of Indian government. It does not matter which passport he/she holds.

What, you want to read people's minds now.
The biggest motivation is always money, not jannat.

Every so called "terrorist" is getting paid by some government, and is technically a soldier.
Killing an enemy soldier who is engaged in sabotage is the duty of Indian government. It does not matter which passport he/she holds.

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The biggest motivation is always kuran and jannat.

Every so called "terrorist" is getting brainwashed by some mulla, and is technically a jihadi.
Killing a kafir/mushkir is his holy war or jihad.